Modern Broods; Or, Developments Unlooked For

“But she is not alive.  She couldn’t be,” sighed Lena.  “I like my Ben and my kangaroo!  Oh, I do want to go back to my kangaroo!”

“And does Lily want to go back to her riki-tiki?” asked Lily’s father, lifting a little girl on each knee, so that they might be vis-à-vis, when certainly his own had the advantage in beauty, as she answered, leaning against him, “Granny’s better than riki-tiki!”

For which pretty speech some of the ladies gave her much credit; but her father, with a tender arm round her, said, “Ah! you are a sentimental little pussy-cat!  Is anything here as good as Carrigaboola?  Eh, Lena?”

But Lena resolutely shook her carrots; but kept silence, while Bernard turned over the leaves of a great book of natural history, till as a page was displayed with a large kangaroo under a blue-gum tree, with a yellow wattle tree beside him, her lips quivered, her face puckered, and she burst into an uncontrollable fit of crying; “Oh!  I want to go home, home!  Sister, Sister, take me home!”

Angela was in a minute beside her, took her within loving arms, and carried her off.

CHAPTER XXIV—CRUEL LAWYERS

“Tender companions of our serious days,Who colour with your kisses, smiles and tears,Life’s worn web woven over wasted ways.”—Lowell.

There was a good deal of worry and anxiety for some little time, while correspondence was going on about Henry Merrifield’s will, and in the meantime Angela decided to board with Miss Prescott, since her charge was certainly much better in health there; and besides, as Mrs. Bernard Merrifield was naturally at Clipstone, it became the head quarters of her husband, though he made many excursions to his own people, and on business affairs to Sir Ferdinand Travis Underwood in London.

And Clipstone suited him well for his holiday.  Sir Jasper had, of course, a certain amount of intercourse with the garrison at Avoncester, and the officers stationed there at present had already some acquaintance with Bernard Underwood, who was known to be a champion in Ceylon in all athletic sports, especially polo and cricket.  Tall and well made, he had been devoted to all such games in his youth, and they had kept up his health in his sedentary occupation.  Now, in his leisure time, his prowess did much to efface the fame of the much younger and slighter Alexis White, and, so far as might be, Angela enjoyed the games with him, keeping well within bounds, but always feeling activity a wholesome outlet for her superfluous strength, and, above all, delighting in an interval of being a child again with her Bear of old times; and her superabundant life, energy, and fun amazed all, especially by the contrast with her poor little languid charge, who seemed, as Jane Mohun said, centuries older.

The Merrifield lads were also devoted to him.  Even Fergus was somewhat distracted from his allegiance to Dolores and her experiments, and in the very few days that Christmas afforded for skating, could think of nothing else.

And as to Wilfred, his whole mind seemed to be set on sports, and marble works to be only an incident thrown in.  Bernard, whom he followed assiduously, and who took him to Avoncester, and introduced him to young officers, began to have doubts whether he had done wisely.  Bernard had, in his time, vexed Felix’s soul by idleness and amusement, but he had been one betted upon, not himself given to betting.  He loved football and cricket for their bodily excitement, not the fictitious one of a looker on, or reader of papers, and it struck him that Wilfred knew a good deal too much about this more dangerous side of races and athletics.

He said so to Angela, and she answered, “Oh, nonsense!  Young men are out of it if they don’t know the winning horse.  Even Pur had to be up to the Derby.”

And Angela had her own bitter trial in the decision of the lawyers.  Not only was the signature of the will unsatisfactory, from the confusion between Field and Merrifield, but the two witnesses failed to be traced, John Shepherd and George Jones were not to be identified, and though Brisbane might accept wills easily, an English court of law required more certainty.  The little daughter being the only child and natural heiress, this was not felt to be doing her any injury; but the decision deprived her of the guardian her father had chosen, and Angela was in despair.  She was ready to write to the Pursuivant, to the Bishop of Albertstown, to the Lord Chancellor, with an exposition of the wicked injustice and hardness of heart of lawyers, and the inexpedience of taking the poor child from her earliest motherly friend, expressly chosen by her father.  All Bernard’s common sense and Magdalen’s soothing were needed to make her hold her peace, when correspondence made it plain that the guardianship being assumed by the uncles, Captain Merrifield would not hear for a moment of the scheme of taking the child out to Carrigaboola.  In his opinion, and his sister Susan’s, the only fit thing to be done with her was to place her with the two aunts at Coalham to be educated.  He came down to Rock Quay to inspect her.  It was a cold, raw day, with the moors wrapped in mist, and the poor little maid looked small, peaky and pinched.  He was sure that the dry winds of the north were what she needed, wanted to carry her off immediately, and looked regardless of Angela’s opinion, though backed by Miss Prescott, that it would be highly dangerous to take the delicate child of a semi-tropical climate off in the depth of winter to a northerly town.  Angela walked off to ask Dr. Dagger to inspect the child and give his opinion, while Captain Sam repaired to Clipstone to visit his relations and lunch with them.

He did not meet with all the sympathy he expected.  Lady Merrifield said that Coalham had not agreed with her own son Harry, and that little Lena ought not to be taken there till after the cold winds of spring were over; and her daughters all chimed in with a declaration that Angela Underwood was perfectly devoted to the little one, and that no one else could make her happy.

“Petting her! spoiling her!” scoffed the Captain.  “Why, Susan and Bessie were full of the contrast with your little girl.”

“Health,” began Phyllis.

“An Indian child too!” he went on.  “Just showing what a little good sense in the training can do!  No, indeed!  Since I am to be her guardian, I have no notion of swerving from my duty, and letting poor Hal’s child be bred up to Sisterhoods and all that flummery.”

“It will just break Angela’s heart,” cried Valetta, with tears in her eyes, at which the Captain looked contemptuous.

“I must say,” added Bernard, “that I should think it little short of murderous to take that unlucky child from the one woman who understands her up into the bleak north at this time of year.”

“Decidedly!” added Sir Jasper.  “Miss Underwood deserves every consideration in dealing with the child who has been always her sole charge.”

Wherewith he changed the conversation by a question about Stokesley; but he held to his dictum when alone with his nephew, and as he was the only person for whose opinion Captain Sam had any respect, it had its effect, though there was a sense that he might be biassed by his son-in-law and his herd of womanfolk, and that he did not partake Mrs. Samuel Merrifield’s dislike to the very name of Sister or of anything not commonplace.

Angela obtained Dr. Dagger’s opinion to reinforce her own and Lady Merrifield’s, and the Captain was obliged to give way so far as to consent to Magdalen, as he insisted on calling her, being allowed to remain at Arnscombe till after Easter, when her aunts were to fetch her to Coalham, there to send her to the kindergarten.

After Angela’s period of raging against law and lawyers and all the Stokesley family, and being on the verge of impertinence to Captain Merrifield, she submitted to the prospect more quietly than her friends had dared to hope.  Lance had almost expected her to deport her charge, parrot and all, suddenly and secretly by an Australian liner, and had advised Bernard, on a fleeting meeting at Bexley, to be on his guard if she hinted at anything so preposterous; but Bernard shook his head, and said Angel was more to be trusted than her elders thought.  “Waves and storms don’t go over us for nothing, I hope,” he said.

And he found himself right on his return.  Angela had bowed her head to the inevitable, and was quietly trying to prepare her little charge for the change, accustoming her to more discipline and less petting.  When Angela proposed to walk over to Clipstone with her brother on his return, and the whine was set up, “Let me go, Sister,” it was answered, “No, my dear, it is too far for you.  You must stay and walk with Paula.”

“I want to go with Sister.”

“You must be a good child, and do as Sister tells you.  No, I can’t have any fretting.  Paula will show you how to drive your hoop.  Keep her moving fast, Paula, don’t let her fret and get cold.”

And Angela actually detached the clinging hand, and put it into Paulina’s, and, holding up her finger, silenced the burst of weeping, though tears sprang to her own eyes as she resolutely turned away, and, after running out and shutting the back gate after her, put her arm with a clinging gesture into Bernard’s.

“That’s right!” he said, pressing her hand.

“Cruel,” she said, “but better by and by for her.  Oh, Bear, if one could but learn to lie still and say, ‘Thou didst it,’ when it is human agency that takes away the desire of one’s eyes with a stroke.”

“The desire of thine eyes!” repeated Bernard.  “How often I thought of that last February.”

It was the only time he had referred to the loss of his little boy.  His wife had told her mother that he could not bear to mention it, and had poured out all her own feelings of sorrow and her struggle for cheerfulness and resignation alone with her or with Mysie; but he had shrunk from the least allusion to the little two year old Felix, who slept beneath a palm tree at Colombo.

Now, however, still holding his sister’s hand, he drifted into all the particulars of the little ways, the baby language, the dawning understanding, and the very sudden sharp illness carrying the beautiful boy away almost before they were aware of danger; and he took out the photograph from his breast, and showed her the little face, so recalling old fond remembrances.  “Forbear to cry, make no mourning for the dead,” he repeated.  “Yes, the boy is saved the wear and tear and heat and burthen of the day, but it is very hard to be thankful.”

“Ah, and it is all the harder if you have to leave your Lily.”

“If—yes; but Travis may so arrange that we can stay, or I make only one voyage out to settle matters and then come home for good.  If you are still bent on Carrigaboola you might come as far as Frisco with me.  I may have to go there about the Californian affairs.”

“That would be jolly.  Yes, I think it will clench the matter, for I believe I am of more good at Carriga than anywhere else, though the heart of it is taken out of it for me; but one lives on and gets on somehow without a heart, or a heart set where I suppose it ought not to be entirely at least!  And, indeed, I think that little one taught me better than ever before how to love.”

“That’s what the creatures are sent us for,” said Bernard, in a low voice.  “And here are, looming in the distance, all the posse of girls to meet us.”

“Ah-h!” breathed Angela, withdrawing her arm.  “Well, Bear, you have given me something to look forward to, whether it comes to anything or not.  It will help me to be thankful.  I know they are good people, and the child will do well when once the pining and bracing are over.  They are her own people, and it is right.”

“Right you are, Angel!” said Bernard, with a fresh squeeze of the hand, as he resumed his own cheerful, resolute voice ere joining his sisters-in-law.

“What!  Angela without her satellite!” cried Primrose.

“Too far,” murmured Angela; but Mysie tried to hush her sister, perceiving the weaning process, and respecting Angela for it.

And the next moment Angela was challenging Bernard to a game at golf.

CHAPTER XXV—BEAR AS ADVISER

“Weary soul and burthened soreLabouring with thy secret load.”—Keble.

The early spring brought a new development.  Thekla, who attended classes at the High School, came home with unmistakable tokens of measles, and Primrose did the same, in common with most of their contemporaries at Rockstone.  Nor was there any chance that either Lily Underwood at Clipstone or Lena Merrifield at the Goyle would escape; indeed, they both showed an amount of discomfort that made it safer to keep them where they were, than to try to escape in the sharp east wind and frost.

No one was much dismayed at what all regarded as a trifling ailment, even if dignified as German.  Angela owned that she regarded it as a relief, since infection might last till the summer, and the only person who was—as he owned—trying to laugh at himself with Angela, was Bernard, who could not keep out of his mind’s eye a little grave at Colombo.  As he walked home, at the turning he saw a figure wearily toiling upwards, which proved to be Wilfred.  “Holloa! you are at home early!”

“I had an intolerable headache!”

“Measles, eh?”

“No such thing!  Once when I was a kid in Malta.  But I say, Bear,” he added, coming up with quickened pace, “you could do me no end of a favour if you would advance me twenty pounds.”

“Whew!” Bernard whistled.

“There is Lady Day coming, and I can pay you then—most assuredly.”  And an asseveration or two was beginning.

“Twenty pounds don’t fly promiscuously about the country,” muttered Bernard, chiefly for the sake of giving himself time.

“But I tell you I shall have a quarter from the works, and a quarter from my father (with his hand to his head).  That’s—that’s—.  Awful skinflints both of them!  How is a man to do, so cramped up as that?”

“Oh! and how is a man to do if he spends it all beforehand?”

“I tell you, Bernard, I must have it, or—or it will break my mother’s heart!  And as to my father, I’d—I’d cut my throat—I’d go to sea before he knew!  Advance it to me, Bear!  You know what it is to be in an awful scrape.  Get me through this once and I’ll never—”

Bernard did not observe that the scrape of his boyhood over the drowned Stingo had hardly been of the magnitude that besought for twenty pounds.  He waived the personal appeal, and asked, “What is the scrape?”

“Why, that intolerable swindler and ruffian, Hart, deceived me about Racket, and—”

“A horse at Avoncester?” said Bernard, light beginning to dawn on him.

“I made sure it was the only way out of it all, and they said Racket was as sure as death, and now the brute has come in third.  Hart swears there was foul play, but what’s that to me?  I’m done for unless you will help me over.”

“If it is a betting debt, the only safe way is to have it out with your father, and have done with it.”

“You don’t know what my father is!  Just made of iron.  You might as well put your hand under a Nasmyth’s hammer.”  And as he saw that his hearer was unconvinced, “Besides, it is ever so much more than what I put upon Racket!  That was only the way out of it!  It is all up with me if he hears of it.  You might as well pitch me over the cliff at once!”

“Well, what is it then?”

Incoherently, Wilfred stammered out what Bernard understood at last to mean that he had got into the habit of betting at the billiard table, surreptitiously kept up in Ivinghoe Terrace in a house of Richard White’s, not for any excessive sums, and with luck at first on his side than otherwise; but at last he had become involved for a sum not in itself very terrible to elder years, and his creditor was in great dread of pressure from his employers, and insisted on payment.  Wilfred, who seemed to have a mortal terror of his father, beyond what Bernard could understand, had been unable to believe that the offence for so slight a sum might be forgiven if voluntarily confessed, had done the worst thing he could, he had paid the debt with a cheque which had, unfortunately, passed through his hands at the office, trusting in a few days to recover the amount by a bet upon the horse, in full security of success!  And now!

Before the predicament was made clear, Wilfred reeled, and would have fallen if Bernard had not supported him, and he mumbled something about giddiness and dazzling, insisting at the same time that it was nothing but the miserable pickle, and that if Bernard would not see him out of it, he might as well let him lie there and have done with it.

Happily they were in the immediate neighbourhood of the house, and it was possible to get him into the hall before he entirely collapsed upon a chair; but seeming to recover fresh vigour from alarm at the sound of voices, he rushed at the stairs and dashed up rapidly the two flights to his own room, only throwing back the words, “Dead secret, mind!”

Bernard was glad to have made no promise, and, indeed, Wilfred’s physical condition chiefly occupied him at the moment, for one or two of the girls were hurrying in, asking what was the matter, and at the answer, “He is gone up to his room with a bad headache,” Valetta declared with satisfaction, “Then he has got it!  We told him so!  But he would go to the office! and, Bernard, so has Lily.”

“Pleasing information!” said Bernard, nettled and amused at the tone of triumph, while Mysie, throwing behind her the words, “It may be nothing,” went off to call Mrs. Halfpenny, who was in a state of importance and something very like pleasure.  Bernard strode up to his wife’s room, leaving Valetta half-way in her exposition that when all the family had been laid low by measles at Malta, Wilfred had been a very young infant, and it had always been doubtful whether he had been franked or not; and how he had been reproached with looking ill in the morning, but had fiercely insisted on going down to the office, which he was usually glad to avoid on any excuse.

By the time the household met at dinner, it was plain that they had to resign themselves to being an infected family, though there were not many probable victims, and they were likely only to have the disorder favourably, with the exception of Wilfred, who had evidently got a severe chill, and could only be reported as very ill, though still he vehemently resented any suspicion of being subject to such a babyish complaint.  But when the break up for the night was just over, Lady Merrifield came in search of Bernard, entreating him to come to speak to Wilfred, who was more and more feverish, almost light-headed, and insisting that he must speak to Bear, “Bear had not promised,” reiterating the summons, so that there was no choice but to comply with it.

He found Wilfred flushed with fever, and violently restless, starting up in bed as he entered, and crying out, “Bear, Bear, will you? will you?  You did not promise!”

“I will see about it!  Lie down now!  There’s nothing to be done to-night.”

“But promise! promise!  And not a word!”

All this was reiterated till Wilfred at last was exhausted for the time, and to a certain degree pacified by the reassuring voice in which Bernard soothed him and undertook to take the matter in hand, hardly knowing what he undertook, and only feeling the necessity of quieting the perilous excitement, and of helping the mother to bring a certain amount of tranquillity.

His own little girl was going on well, and quite capable of being amused in the morning by being compared to a lobster or a tiger lily; and Primrose was reported in an equally satisfactory state, ready either for sleep or continuous reading by her sisters.  Only Wilfred was in the same, or a more anxious, state of fever; and as soon as Bernard had satisfied himself that there was no special use in his remaining in the house, he set out for the marble works office, having made up his mind as to one part of what he had expressed as “seeing about it.”

He had hardly turned into the Cliffe road before he met Captain Henderson walking up, and they exchanged distant inquiries and answers as to whether each might be thought dangerous to the other’s home; after which they forgathered, and compared notes as to invalids.  The Captain had heard of Wilfred’s going home ill, and was coming, he said, to inquire.

“He seems very seriously ill,” was the answer.  “I imagine there has been a chill, and a check.  I was coming to speak to you about him.”

“He has spoken to you?”

Both could now consult freely.  “It is a very anxious matter—not so much for the actual amount as for the habits that it shows.”

“The amount?  Oh, I have made up that as regards the firm.  I could not let it come before Sir Jasper, especially in the present state of things!  I meant to give the young chap a desperate fright and rowing, but that will have to be deferred.”

“You must let me take it!”

“No, no.  Remember, Sir Jasper was my commanding officer, and I and my wife owe everything to him.  I could supply the amount, so that no one would guess from the accounts that anything had been amiss.”

Bernard could hardly allow himself to be thus relieved, but there was the comfort of knowing that Wilfred’s name was safe, and that the unstained family honour would not have to suffer shame.  Still the other debts remained, of which Captain Henderson had been only vaguely suspicious, till the two took counsel on them.  Wilfred had not given up the name of the person for whom he had meant to borrow from the office; but Captain Henderson had very little doubt who it was, and it was agreed that he should receive the amount through a cheque of Bernard on Brown and Travis Underwood, from Captain Henderson’s hands, with a scathing rebuke and peremptory assurance of exposure to Mr. White, and consequent dismissal, if anything more of the same kind among the younger men were detected.  The man was a clever artist in his first youth, and had always been something of a favourite with the authorities, and had a highly respectable father; so Captain Henderson meant to spare him as much as possible, and endeavour to ascertain how far the mischief had gone among the young men connected with the marble works, also to consult Mr. White on the amount of stringency in the measures used to put a stop to it.  All this, of course, passed out of Bernard Underwood’s hands and knowledge, but a sad and anxious day was before him.  All the young girls were going on well, but Wilfred was increasingly ill all day, and continually calling for Bernard.  Being told, “I have settled the matter” did not satisfy him.  He looked eagerly about the room to find whether his mother were present, and fancying she was absent demanded, “Does he know?  Do they know?” reiterating again and again.  It was necessary to tell Lady Merrifield that there was an entanglement about money matters on his mind, which had been settled; but towards evening he grew worse and more light-headed, apparently under the impression that only Bernard could guard him from something unknown, or conceal, whenever he was conscious of the presence of his mother; and on his father’s entrance he hid his face in the pillows and trembled, of course to their exceeding distress and perplexity; and when he believed no one present but Bernard and Mrs. Halfpenny, he became more and more rambling, sometimes insisting that his father must not know, sometimes abusing all connected with the racing bet, and more often fancying that he was going to be arrested for robbing the firm, the enormity of the sum and of the danger increasing with the fever, and therewith his horror of his father’s knowing.  It was of no use for his mother to hang over him, hold his hands, and assure him that she knew (as, in fact, she did, for Bernard had been obliged to make a cursory explanation), and that nothing could hinder her loving him still; he forgot it in the next interruption, and turned from her with terror and dismay, and once he nearly flung himself out of bed, fancying that the policeman was coming.

Bernard held him on this occasion, and told him, “Nothing will do you good, Willie, but to tell your father, and he will keep all from you.  Let him know, and it will be all right.”

It only seemed to add to his misery and terror.  Something that passed in his hearing, gave him the impression that he was in great danger, if not actually dying; but his cry was still for Bernard, who had not ventured to go to bed; but it was still, “Oh, Bear, save me!  Don’t let me die with this upon my name!  I can’t go to God!”